James Bond 1999

THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH

By TOM SOTER
from MOVIE TIMES, 1999

In James Bond movies, as in real estate, the catchphrase could be “location, location, and location.” While many moviegoers have flocked to the 007 thrillers for the gadgets and girls, a prime appeal has also been the franchise’s exotic foreign locales. A travelogue with a kick, the globe-hopping series has found its villains on the beachfronts of the Bahamas (Thunderball), skiing down the snow-peaked Swiss Alps (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service), hiding among the pyramids of Egypt (The Spy Who Loved Me), and lurking in the Turkish flea markets of Istanbul (From Russia With Love).

For The World Is Not Enough, the new Bond opening November 19, one location was certainly not enough: Pierce Brosnan’s third 007 outing finds the superspy jetting from London to Turkey and from Spain to the French Alps in a battle royale to save the world’s oil supply from destruction.

The tricky location work involved staging a high-speed motor boat chase on the busy Thames river in London. The sequence found the actors firing off machine-guns outside the Houses of Parliament, while the crew set off dynamite near the financial district and at the Victoria Docklands, next to the city’s airport. Besides creating explosions that had maximum effect with minimum impact, the production team also had to work closely with air traffic controllers so that the shooting did not disrupt any aircraft overhead. Noting that there were 25 different locations within this one episode alone, producer Michael Wilson wryly observed: “This is something no one else has tried before. And when I see the logistics involved, I understand why.”

The crew also flew to the town of Chamonix in the French Alps for an aerial ski chase that had to cope with the serious possibility of avalanches. In addition, there were other problems that made some feel as though they were in the military: “It’s pretty inaccessible, especially when it snows,” said second unit director Vic Armstrong. “It’s like moving an army.”

Nonetheless, for 007’s audiences, those larger-than-life miracles are par for the course. “You come to each Bond film looking to make it bigger and better,” noted miniature effects supervisor John Richardson. “That’s the challenge.”